Sociology 2240E Lecture Notes - Lecture 6: Symbolic Interactionism, Sex Assignment, Erving Goffman
19 Apr 2016
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Doing gender: candance west and don zimmerman (1987) Presentation of the self/ impression management: appearance/ manners/ idealization. Margin of interactions; not at the heart of identities, conduct & discourse. West & zimmerman will challenge this idea. Gender is not simply a role you can or can not adopt. Nor is it a the margin of social interactions. Gender shapes and impacts most other social roles. At 17 decides to live as a woman and undergoes sex reassignment surgery. Feels this surgery corrected a mistake of nature. Sex: set of biological criteria used to classify body as male or female. Sex category: male/female binary; placement has to do with an assumption about sex based on more superficial displays (hair, dress). Gender: process of actively managing conduct in light of normative attitudinal and behavioural expectations appropriate for one"s sex category. Difficult to think of a person without a sex assignment. Binary imposed at every stage of socialization (family; school).
